Tomas
by Thomas Raven
Summary: A centuries-old vampire mage with a curse decides to put in some effort against the forces of good, and arrives in Sunnydale with powers that will have lasting consequences for the Scoobies and the Fang Gang. Warning: MAJOR Character Death
1. Prologue

A/N: I do not own BTVS, Angel or any of the characters or settings. I'd really rather not get sued... However, I DO own Tomas(I think) and the idea for this story. Any similarities to other works are, aside from the aforementioned, completely unintentional.

This takes place in BTVS S6 and Angel S3. Post-"Gone" for Buffy, and for Angel, after Lorne's club gets firebombed.

In every dimension, there are differences. Some are small, like losing your car keys. Some are large, like people being born male instead of female. But eventually, they all have consequences.

Salem, Massachusets

1802

As most of the magic group got up to leave, the leader reached out a hand. "Tomas, wait. Be careful."

The young man grinned. "Always am. Something wrong?"

The leader's face creased. "Not that I know of. But something just doesn't feel right."

Tomas began to look concerned. "What do you mean?"

"I don't know. I just have a feeling about tonight. Like it's a turning point."

The mage put a reassuring hand on his teacher's shoulder. "If it makes you feel any better, I'll keep an eye out."

"Thank you. Be careful."

As Tomas left on his way back to his home, he glanced into a patch of shadows, and almost tripped over himself when he noticed a body there.

He quickly rushed over. As he bent down and turned the body over, he heard a moan. "Are you alright?"

A grin began to grow on the fallen man's face as he looked at Tomas. "Never better."

As he lunged for the boy, his face seemed to grow strange, inhuman. The practicing mage never had time to scream.

Several days later.

The leader touched a hand to his forehead in regret. The night before last, Tomas' body had been discovered in an alleyway, dead from puncture wounds.

Suddenly, he heard someone moving behind him. Conjuring a small fireball, he spun around, only to freeze as he recognized the figure. "Tomas?"

The young man stumbled over to his old mentor, placing a hand upon the teacher's shoulder. "Not quite."

As the vampire's fangs pierced his throat, the mage could barely mumble out the words of the spell he cast. "May it be that in 200 years, this demon will fall. Until then, you may commit acts of unspeakable evil, but you will fall."

With those last defying words, the old man fell to the floor, drained of both blood and magic.

"Be that as it may, teacher, I'll use those two hundred years and use them well. I intend to use this world and its inhabitants as I wish, and no one, not anyone, will be able to stop me!"


	2. Chapter 1

For disclaimer and continuity, see the prologue.

Sunnydale, California

Present Day

The Welcome to Sunnydale sign shivered in the light wind, causing the wooden sign to sway back and forth.

Seemingly from nowhere, a figure dressed in a black trenchcoat and dark glasses strode up and lay a hand on the sign. "Ahh. the Hellmouth. Home of the soon-to-be-late Slayer."

An evil grin threatened to consume the figure's face. "When I'm through with her and her friends, they won't know what hit them.

The next night

Anya was in a good mood as she minded the Magic Box. She had taken in a lot of money today, and it was still an hour until closing time.

Glancing out the front window, she automatically made note of the fact that it was twilight, then resumed scanning for customers. It had been a slow day. Willow and Tara were over at Willow's dorm trying to help the witch get over her magic abuse, and Buffy was out on patrol. Her attention was caught by a cloaked figure striding in through the front door. "Hello, welcome to the Magic Box. Can I help you?"

The figure smiled. "Yes, I'm looking to send a message."

Anya turned and began searching the shelves. "What kind of message?"

"A message for the Slayer."

The ex-demon spun around only for the man's hand to wrap around her neck, lifting her up until her head cleared the top of the bookshelf. "The kind of message that involves certain kinds of... corpses. I think I'll start with you. Anyanka, isn't it?"

She managed to choke out words. "What do you want? vengeance?"

"Vengeance? no. Just blood."

The last thing she saw was the man, or demon, drawing a very dangerous-looking blade from inside his coat.

Xander Harris was smiling as he walked home from work. Willow and Tara had come by to pick him up at the construction site, and the three of them had decided to go by the Magic Box.

He knew something was wrong almost the moment they walked into the store. The front desk was unattended, and there was a note in unfamiliar handwriting on the door to the back room.

The note read, simply: IN THE BACK

Xander pushed open the door to the back room and doubled over in pain and horror. Anya's torn and bloodied corpse was strewn about the training room. Her limbs and intestines hung alongside the bladed weapons, her spine was wrapped around the light fixtures, and her sagging stomach, still with the head attached at the neck, was set up in place of the training dummy.

Willow and Tara recoiled from the door, shock and disgust plainly evident on their features, just as Xander was flung into the room by an unseen force. Streams of golden-black magic wrapped around the two Wicca's, binding their powers, as the man suddenly appeared in front of the counter.

Smiling, he removed his sunglasses to reveal a handsome face topped by dark hair that quickly mutated into the misshapen visage of a vampire. But still he smiled.

"I am Tomas. For twenty-four years I studied magic in Massachusetts. Until that night almost 200 years ago, when I was turned by a common vampire. The first man I turned, my old teacher, placed a curse upon me, that in 200 years I would be destroyed. But I slew him, drained his magic. And spent the following years hunting down the greatest magical warriors of this world, killing them. And then I heard the tales of the Slayer. A weapon built to kill vampires, the longest living of them all, supposedly because she had... friends. "

Tomas paused, baring his teeth. "And so I decided I would come here. I would test myself against this slayer and her friends, and I would win."

He approached them, as they struggled against the binding magic's. "Given time, you would almost certainly break free. Even I only have so much power."

He smiled, running his tongue along Willow's neck, enjoying the raw fear on their faces. "Lucky for me I don't intend to allow that to happen.

Xander pounded upon the door until his hands grew raw and red, and the tears streaming down his face had settled at the base of his neck. And as he heard his friends scream until they no longer could, he sank down to the floor, and cried.


	3. Chapter 2

For disclaimers and continuity, see prologue

Xander wept until he had no more tears to give, and then he noticed that he couldn't hear anything from the front of the shop. He rose to his feet, knowing what that meant.

The door opened easily, the magicks earlier placed upon it no longer in effect.

He looked upon the two bodies that lay crumpled upon the floor, and he began to run.

He knew Buffy was patrolling tonight. He'd go to Spike's crypt, and go from there. He had to warn her about this vampire.

He found her at the vampire's crypt, the smashed bowl of chips on the floor and spilled soda, along with the presence of Clem, indicating that she had interrupted something.

All three occupants looked up, momentarily stunned, as he burst in, his sweatshirt soaked with blood and tears.

Buffy was the first to react. "Xander? what-what're you doing here?"

Spike stumbled to his feet. "Oi! This ain't a bleedin' convention!"

Xander ignored him. "Buffy, there's a new master vampire in town. Tomas, I think his name is. He's powerful, and he's looking for you."

Buffy looked a little confused. "Tomas? Spike, you know anything about a Tomas? Spike?"

Buffy and Xander looked over to the suddenly paler than usual vampire, his eyes wide and his mouth hanging open. "Tomas?"

Xander nodded the affirmative. "Yeah. You know him?"

"I know **of** him, yeah. He's bad news. Almost 200 years old, and he's been practicing magic since before he was turned. guy's one of the legendary vamps."

Buffy was pacing across the crypt now. "Alright. Xander, go over to my house and make sure Dawn's safe. Spike, you and I will go and find Willow and Tara. Maybe they can do a locator spell or something-"

Xander interrupted the slayer, his eyes suddenly blank. "They can't. They're dead. Just like Anya."

Buffy and Spike looked at him, their eyes wide. Buffy was at his side in seconds. "Oh, god, Xander, I'm sorry." She sat down on the stone stairs with a thump. "Oh, god, Will. Oh, god..." She began to weep.

Spike got up and went over to her. "It's okay, It's okay. Here's what we're going to do. Xander and Clem will go over to your house and get Dawn, and you and I will find this bastard and kick his ass."

"Or maybe I could just kill you all straight off." A cold, mocking voice sounded from the doorway. Xander looked up into Tomas's eyes.

Buffy instantly charged at him, knocking him out into the graveyard. "Go! You guys find Dawn! I'll hold him off."

"No, you won't." Tomas growled. Kicking Buffy off of him. The blonde hit the cold stone wall of the crypt and slumped to the grass.

Standing and righting himself, Tomas turned his attention to the others. Clem broke his gaze and began to run, but Tomas raised his arm and threw something through the air, and Clem fell to the grass dead.

Spike rushed forward, and struck the sorcerer with an uppercut, throwing him back. Buffy leapt onto his back, wrapping her slender arms around his neck.

Tomas roared and threw the Slayer forward, sending her tumbling into Spike.

As they both fell to the ground, Xander rushing back inside the crypt, Tomas strode over to them. Taking Buffy by the neck with one hand, Tomas lifted her into the air.

As she began to choke, she shouted down to a frozen Spike. "Save Dawn! You and Xander take Dawn to LA! Take her to Angel!" She was cut off by Tomas's grip tightening. As Xander reemerged from the crypt, his eyes locked on the diminutive Slayer, lightening flashed and it began to rain.

Buffy continued to struggle in his grip. "Tell Dawn... tell Dawn I love her." She began to cry.

Xander and Spike were frozen, horrified, but the grin on Tomas's face grew ever larger and his grip on Buffy's neck grew ever tighter.

SNAP!

Many miles away, Rupert Giles suddenly awoke, with the certainty that something terrible had happened.


	4. Chapter 3

For disclaimer and continuity, see prologue

Xander and Spike stood, frozen, as Tomas dropped Buffy's body onto the ground. "Alright, then. Who's next?"

Snapping out of the trance they had both been in, Xander raised the crossbow he had retrieved from Spike's weapons chest and fired. "You are!"

The bolt thudded into Tomas's left eye, and the vampire doubled over in pain.

Spike lunged forward, grabbing a piece of wooden debris, and rammed it into Tomas's chest, but just before the makeshift stake penetrated his heart, it bounced off of a magical barrier. Tomas roared out in anger, and swatted Spike away, the vampire landing in a tangle of limbs.

Growling, Tomas vanished into mist.

Xander pulled Spike to his feet. "I think we'd better get Dawn. He's injured, but he'll be back."

Spike nodded. "Yeah. The ones like him always do..."

Rack had just sent another amateur sorcerer away. He was really getting tired of these newbies coming to him and asking for quick power. It was like people coming to him without weed and asking to get high. There hadn't been any excitement in there since Amy had brought the redhead to see him. God, he wished someone like that would come on in...

He sat up abruptly as the sounds of a commotion began to emanate from the waiting room. Ah, well, be careful what you wish for...

He opened the door and stepped out into the waiting area, only to gasp in shock at the sight of the newest arrival. He was a large man, bloody and bruised, with a crossbow bolt protruding from one of his eyes. "What can I do for you?" he asked, trying his damndest not to stutter.

The abomination standing in front of him pulled the arrow shaft from his eye, to reveal that the wound had healed completely. "You can die."

Before he could react, magic began to flow from him into the vampire. As he was drained of his power, he could just barely whisper words. "How?"

Tomas grinned. "That's for me to know, and you to... well, know nothing about."

Dawn was getting annoyed. Buffy still hadn't stopped by to check up on her. She knew her sister had her slayer duties, but wasn't family just the least bit important?

She was jolted out of her thoughts by a frantic knocking at the door. She jumped up, rushing over to the front of the house. She yanked open the door, to find Xander and Spike on the doorstep. The two men rushed in without waiting to be invited, pulling the girl back into the living room. "What's going on? what's happening?"

Xander looked at her worriedly. "We're going out of town for a little while. Maybe to Angel in LA."

This only made Dawn look more confused. "Why? where's Buffy?"

Spike paused, and turned back around to face Dawn. "Niblet, Something's happened to Buffy, Red, Tara, and Anya. they're..."

Xander interrupted. "Dawnster, I'm sorry, but... they're dead."

Dawn sank down to the couch, her eyes wide. "No. Nononononononononononono..."

Tomas was striding down the street to the Summers' house, when he noticed a commotion nearby. He walked over, and was confronted by three young men in black jackets, one of them holding what appeared to be some kind of laser weapon.

One of them stepped forward. "Greetings, demon. We are supervillains. We're going to do... supervillainy stuff. Jonathan, freeze him!"

Tomas drew one of his blades from his sleeve, and slashed the weapon across Warren's throat, blood spraying forth from the wound like a fountain. Jonathan and Andrew paled as their leader's corpse fell to the ground.

Jonathan leveled the freeze ray at the vampire. "Andrew, go find the Slayer's friends! I'll hold him off!"

Andrew drew the keys to the van from one of his pockets. "What? are you crazy?"

The freeze ray fired, but impacted uselessly against a magical shield. "The enemy of my enemy is my friend, dumbass! Go!"

Andrew ran to the van, and pulled away from the bank as Tomas's blade buried itself in the short man's chest.

Tomas looked down at the two bodies. "Well, that was...interesting."

Suddenly, a gang of vampires appeared from the nearby alleyways. Tomas conjured a fireball in his gloved hand. "All right, then. Who's first?"

Dawn was curled up on the couch, murmuring to herself while Xander stood at the door with the crossbow, anxiously scanning the street for any sign of the vampire.

Spike was in the kitchen, searching the countertops for something. "Where're the car keys?"

"On the counter next to the toaster, I think." Xander responded.

Suddenly, a small glass bottle smashed through one of the living room windows, where it impacted, burst, and caught fire.

Xander turned back to the door just to see two distinct things. One, another Molotov cocktail hurtling through the air to set the car out front alight, and two, a gang of several dozen leather-clad vampires arrive at the front lawn.

Dawn snapped out of her trance as Spike scooped the girl up into his arms, and Xander opened the door slightly, braced the crossbow, and fired, dusting one of the vampires, before turning to follow Spike and Dawn out the back.

He found them on the back steps, frozen in fear, and Tomas's form blocking them from the road. "Well, well, well. three little piggies, ready to eat." The vampire began to circle them. "Which of you to go first, I wonder..."

Xander seized a broken chair leg, ignoring the pain from the fire already consuming the object, and threw it like a javelin. The projectile penetrated Tomas's shoulder, and as the vampire stumbled back, a familiar black van crashed through the back fence.

Spike dashed over and pushed Dawn into the vehicle, Andrew opening the back doors to allow them access. Spike scrambled in next, followed closely by Xander.

Tomas rose and hurled a massive spike of lightning, but the van swerved and accelerated, dodging the bolt of magick.

The van reached the outskirts of Sunnydale within minutes. Andrew pulled over a short distance from the Welcome sign, turning to look into the back. "Where to?"

It was Xander who responded, a grim look on his face as he considered. "Where Buffy told us to take Dawn."

Spike looked up, a look on his face like a man about to do something he really didn't want to do. "No. Oh bloody hell please no. Please not there."

Andrew looked confused. "Where?"

Xander glanced at Dawn sympathetically. "To the only friends we have who might be able to help us against this. To Los Angeles. To Angel."


	5. Chapter 4

For Continuity and Disclaimer, see prologue.

It had been one hell of a day. First Anya, then Willow and Tara, then Buffy had been killed by the monster calling itself Tomas. They had picked up Amy on their way out of Sunnydale. The young woman had been wandering along the side of the road. Apparently she had been going to see Rack, and had found him and most of his clientele dead.

But Dawn was the one he was worried about. The girl hadn't spoken a word since Andrew picked them up. Even now she was curled up in the back of the van, hugging herself.

Xander sighed. He just hoped they could get to Angel before Tomas got to them. He glanced around the van. They would have almost no chance at a fight. There was him, the Zeppo, there was one relatively amateur witch, there was Andrew, and there was... He spared a glance at the vampire sitting in the back seat. Alright, there was Spike. He'd still give better odds once they got to Angel.

Angel sighed as he slumped down into the couch. The phone had been ringing off the hook, Gunn was busy delivering some food to Anne, at the shelter, and they still didn't have a clue about Holtz.

He glanced around the lobby of the Hyperion. Fred was manning the reception desk, Wesley was in the back doing research, Cordelia and Groo were with Connor, and Lorne was spread across another of the couches. There came a knock at the door. Lorne groaned. "Whose turn is it?"

Angel groaned in response. "Yours."

There was a creak as the couch shifted, then the sound of footsteps. Then nothing. Lorne's voice came again from behind him. "I, um, I think you should take a look at this..."

Angel turned, and his eyes widened in shock. Just outside of the Hyperion stood Xander, drenched in blood, Dawn, a girl who looked suspiciously like the one who had turned Buffy into a rat once, a boy who looked notably uncomfortable in his present company, and Spike.

He leapt up from the couch and sprinted to the door just as Fred dashed out from behind the desk. "Xander, what happened?"

The other two hung back as Xander helped Dawn over to one of the couches. Spike sauntered up to Angel. "Tomas. Tomas happened to Buffy, to Red and her girl, to his" he jerked a finger over to Xander "girlfriend, and to most of the rest of Sunnydale."

Angel was frozen in shock. "Tomas?"

Spike nodded, leaving the conversation to help Xander with Dawn just as Cordelia, Groo, and Wesley entered the lobby.

"Xander?"

"Spike?"

"Amy?"

"A vampire?"

Angel sighed. It was going to be a long day.

Several hours and several dozen six-packs later...

"God, I can't believe it. I mean, Buffy!"

"And Willow, and Tara, and Anya..."

Angel interrupted Xander and Cordelia. "This is bad. This is bad. This is so very very bad..."

"Where's Gunn? Shouldn't he be back by now?" Fred interrupted.

Angel was about to answer when the television switched on. "Breaking news, a brutal mass murder has occurred at a nearby shelter! Though most of the victims have been identified, many are still unidentified..."

Xander cursed. "He's here..."

"Who? me?"

They spun around to see Holtz standing in front of the back entrance to the hotel, a shotgun clutched in his right hand. "Justine, now!"

A pause.

"Justine?"

The woman's corpse was tossed down the front stairs, as Tomas grinned. He held Andrew in one of his hands, suspending him several feet off of the floor.

Angel paled. "Is that..."

Xander grabbed a sword from the desk. "Yep."

Tomas looked at Holtz. "I'm sorry, was she with you?"

Holtz nodded, numb with shock.

"Too bad." Tomas snapped Andrew's neck effortlessly, tossing the corpse aside. There was the click of a crossbow, and a bolt buried itself in his side. He growled, flinging Wesley aside with a wave of his hand. Spike lunged at him, but he grabbed the vampire in his hands, and he began to burn. Within seconds, all that was left of him was a pile of dust.

Groo snarled as he charged at the vampire with a battleaxe, but Tomas snatched the axe out of the air, and punched straight through the warrior's chest. Smiling, he picked up the axe and flung it through the air to embed itself in Cordelia's ribcage.

"You know, I'm almost disappointed. The Slayer, her friends, you..., I mean, really! Almost two hundred years I've been at this, and there's not a single person who can take me on!"

He laughed, and laughed, and laughed. But then a blue nimbus of magic crashed into him, knocking him off his feet to be suspended in the center of the room, and all heads turned to the door.

Rupert Giles stood there, an aura of magic crackling around him. "I'd like to test that theory."


	6. Chapter 5

For continuity and disclaimer, see prologue.

Xander, Angel, Dawn, Holtz, Wesley, Fred, and Amy stood frozen in the lobby of the Hyperion. The vampire called Tomas was suspended several feet off the ground in the center of the room. Giles stood in the doorway, pure magic crackling around him. "I felt Buffy die. I teleported straight here, and..."

He looked around at the corpses that littered the floor. "Well, I suppose it was still too late."

Holtz was first to break out of the trance that they all had been in as he raised his shotgun and pointed it towards Angel. "I'm going to finish this!"

Xander and Wesley both leapt at him, but Giles gestured with his hand and the gun was shoved to the left.

It fired before they could reach him, but instead of hitting Angel, the bullet impacted Tomas's binds. They crackled for a minute more, before exploding outward.

Tomas hovered in the center of the room, literally glowing with magical power. "That. HURT!"

He shoved a ball of magical energy in Giles' direction, but he leapt to the side, as the doors to the Hyperion exploded outward.

The desk was lifted off of the floor and hurled at Holtz, only for him to be tackled by Angel, allowing the projectile to pass overhead. Holtz looked at Angel like he had grown a second head. "You saved me. Why?"

Angel, gasping, took a minute to answer. "Because... because it was the right thing to do."

He leapt back to his feet and charged back toward the others, leaving Holtz lying on the floor, stunned.

Tomas strode toward Giles to deliver the killing blow, but before he could, Amy leapt onto his back, thin arms wrapped around his neck.

He struggled for a moment, then drove his knives into her stomach. She fell to the floor, bleeding, as Tomas turned back to the doorway. "Now, then-"

"Now you die!"

Giles had pulled himself back to his feet, and let loose a massive burst of magical energy at Tomas, who batted it aside casually.

Amy pulled herself up from where she was bleeding on the floor. "I feel...something."

Wesley rushed over to tend to her as Giles and Tomas battled, but he was tossed away, as her body lit up with magic, then faded. Wesley pulled himself up to look at her... and looked into the eyes of a completely different woman.

Giles's eyes flickered to her, and his mouth fell open. "Jenny?"

Jenny Calendar smiled. "C'mon, Rupert, let's finish this!"

Together, the two mages bound the vampire in magic. Xander approached him, a single wooden stake in his hand. "This is for Buffy, for Willow, for Tara, for Cordelia, for Anya..., and most of all, this is for me!"

He plunged the stake into Tomas's heart. The vampire screamed, and his skin began to peel itself off. Within seconds he was muscle, then bone, then only ash.

Xander looked at Giles and Jenny, then turned to look at the others. They were going to have a lot of cleaning up to do.

Three days later. One of the many Sunnydale cemeteries.

Xander stood at the podium in front of the large crowd that had turned out for Buffy's funeral. He took a moment to look over the assembled crowd. Giles and Jenny were there, of course, and Dawn. Angel had come from L.A. with Wesley, Fred, Holtz, and Connor to pay their own respects. His gaze strayed over to the dark haired slayer at the back of the crowd. They had gotten together their finances, and managed to make bail for her, bringing her to Sunnydale to replace Buffy. No. Nobody could replace Buffy. She was here to continue Buffy's work, however little he might like it. He looked once more out over the crowd, and then he began to speak.

"Who was Buffy Summers? A sister, a warrior, a hero, a lover, a friend. Yes, she was weird. Yes, she was 'cool'. But she didn't care about any of that, because she was just...Buffy."

Jenny leaned into Giles as Xander continued to speak. "So, how did you come back, anyway?"

Jenny smiled. "There was so much raw magical energy coming off of you lot, I just took hold of it and let it drag me back here."

"I don't understand how this could have happened. Buffy was supposed to be the Chosen One! How could one vampire have killed, not only her, but so many others? I thought the Powers were supposed to prevent this kind of thing!"

Jenny's smile faded a little bit. "There are some things that are just necessary, Rupert. You may not know it, but there's always purpose in the things that happen."

He gave her an odd look as she snuggled further into him.

Back at the entrance to the cemetery stood two men. They both wore suits, and were of similar build.

"I still don't see what this accomplished. You killed the Slayer, you killed so damn many of her friends!"

The second man turned to look at him. "The First Evil used Buffy Summers' resurrection to gain a foothold into this dimension. The banished Power, Jasmine, would have used the Chase girl to enter into this reality. Rosenberg would have used the Mass Calling to tip the balance even further than it already had been. I maintain that what I did was for the best."

"I see your point, but that doesn't mean I have to like it."

"I wouldn't expect you to, my friend." The Power sighed. "I wouldn't expect you to."


End file.
